French A level in a year

I'm a graduate with fluent German learnt at school/uni/abroad but I can't well remember the A level workload....

I would love to apply to be a lang. assistant in Quebec but to do this I need an "A level or equivalent" in French (although it doesn't state what grade at A level!). I remember very rudimentary French from Year 7-9 but that is it, and I won't have the opportunity to do an intensive course abroad or afford tuition besides maybe a weekly class, so...what are my chances? What kind of hours a week self-study would I need?

And does anyone know from experience what A level grade in French the British Council expect?

Any help would be great!

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Reply 1

Ice_Queen

Well they probably expect a D or C at least (i.e. a pass grade).
As for whether it's possible to do the whole two year course in one year with one class a week, I don't know. Doesn't sound as if it's going to be easy.

Reply 2

kellywood_5

Ice_Queen

As for whether it's possible to do the whole two year course in one year with one class a week, I don't know. Doesn't sound as if it's going to be easy.

It's more that that- the OP hasn't even done GCSE, so essentially it's a 4 year course in a year. It will be very difficult and you'll have to put a lot of work in, but your fluency in German proves you're good at languages, so it should be possible. I'm not sure if you'd be able to join a class though because although it's possible to do A-level in a year at evening classes, you'd probably need GCSE for that, although you could find out. Actually, I just had an idea. Could you perhaps do GCSE French over the summer? Not the exams obviously, but just the content from a textbook or revision guide. Then you might be allowed to join an A-level class in the autumn. It's best to start finding out now if any such class exists in your area and whether you can sign up.

Reply 3

stockholm

Thanks both of you- that's helpful!

As for classes, I think I have just found a school which tailors specifically to your needs...so hopefully I can just go for conversation practise rather than grammar etc which I can learn at home.

Reply 4

Angelil

^^ Sounds good.

The other things I would recommend are two things that were emphasised quite heavily on my A Level French course in 2004: watch French films (with French subtitles - helps your reading and listening) and read French newspapers (helps you to keep up with current affairs, which will be important in the oral, and helps your reading). Along with these things + the conversation practice and grammar learning you're speaking of, you should be fine, though it will be hard work!

Reply 5

Ronove

I taught myself Spanish A-level in 6 months. You can do it. :smile:

Reply 6

stockholm

Wow! !

So...how did you do it? How many hours a week? Did you learn from scratch? And lots of other questions...!

Reply 7

Ronove

I did it in year 13, I'd done the GCSE in a year and a half or something and got an A*. Then I had the whole of year 12 sans Spanish, and decided that I wanted to do it again at the end of that. I'd pretty much forgotten everything but it was easy enough to brush up on the basics. In late December I started properly. I bought a couple of textbooks and read El Pais online to build my vocabulary on each of the topics. It took me ages to decide which essay topics to do but for AS I did the environment and for A2 I did Spanish cinema after 1960 and Historia de una escalera (a play). If you use the exam board AQA they have lots of past questions and marking schemes which help. Examiners reports also help since they describe where people have gone wrong and what they look for in a good essay/whatever. I also tried listening to Spanish (and Cuban) radio online and bought some films to watch. I had my other subjects to keep on top of (tbh I just cruised for most of it, I would have done much better if I had spent more time on the subjects) but I spent most time on Spanish. I think I might have worked on it for 4-10 hours a week (very slowly though, I take ages sitting around thinking about what I'm going to do and planning rather than jumping into it).

Reply 8

gaijin

kellywood_5

Except GCSE's are watered down somewhat due to the nature of the work-load at that age. Its taken me about a year to get up to GCSE level in Japanese, it probably would have taken 6 months if I hadn't had other work to do.

Its possible to get up to A-Level standard fairly quickly, especially from scratch - or at least that is what Sheffield are telling me. :rolleyes:

Without sounding a little arrogant however, I do think French is one of the easier languages to go up to A-Level in, so therefore the work-load might not be that much. Especially if you put the effort in.

Reply 9

kellywood_5

gaijin

Agreed. It in theory took me 9 months to get from scratch to an A* at GCSE in Spanish, but in reality I worked regularly for a couple of weeks, then did nothing for most of the year because I had too much A-level work, then crammed like mad for a couple of weeks during the Easter holidays! Ab initio courses at uni go from scatch to A-level in an academic year and for me that's 5 hours a week and not much homework, so when you put it like that, it doesn't sound too bad. I wouldn't know about French being easier than other languages to get up to A-level in though, since it's the only language I've got that far in! I'm supposed to be in Spanish by now, but it doesn't feel like it....

Reply 10

Angelil

Kelly - I've found that with ab initio languages, when they say that you'll be at x standard in a year, you're probably in reality only at that level in terms of grammar, but suffering in terms of vocab. That certainly seems to be my experience with Greek and Latin (GCSE level in 1 year and A Level in 2 years respectively). I'm probably at those levels in terms of grammar, but my vocab is crap and I know it. Cramming makes little difference as it simply can't compare with people who've had the chance to absorb the same vocab over a number of years. Not that this is necessarily bad - you'll always catch up eventually - but it is the fact of the situation I think.

Reply 11

gaijin

Angelil

This is generally the case with Sheffield. You of course cannot learn that much in 6 months - however grammatically you can. I'm focusing on getting the kanji and vocab down as I think I'll be sick of grammar come January. (I'm doing Linguistics as well. :s-smilie:

)

To be honest you can get the vocab in, it all depends on natural ability, time and effort. I think top down learning is better than bottom up when learning language though. Vocab should seem easier once you have a grasp of the language and you can modify verbs etc.

In Japanese though, you to have also learn the script as well - which adds a new repertoire of skills that over linguists don't have to learn. Its not enough to simply recognise them, you have to be able to write them (in correct stroke order!) and then remember the multiple pronunciations. >_<

Reply 12

generalebriety

gaijin

Except GCSE's are watered down somewhat due to the nature of the work-load at that age.

6 weeks to get to GCSE Spanish level here (and 10 days for German, but I was in Germany so that doesn't count :wink:

Reply 13

generalebriety

Angelil

That kind of becomes unimportant if you have a dictionary. :wink:

Consider the converse. Knowing every word ever, but not knowing how it all went together, would be ridiculous - particularly for a classicist, with all the bloody inflections and so on. Sentences starting on one page and the verb coming three pages later. :p:

Reply 14

kellywood_5

Angelil

Definitely. All we really seem to have done this whole year is grammar. Having said that, I've had to read 2 novels and a play in Spanish and they weren't too bad, so I suppose my vocab can't be that terrible, but it's mainly because a lot of the words are so simiar to either French or English :p:

Reply 15

Angelil

It is a different ball game with Ancient Greek - different script and all :s-smilie:

- but yes, it does come more easily once the grammar's gone in.

Reply 16

dans

I do not think that French is the easiest language to get to A level standard because most uni's that I have looked at require French to at least A level standard before you can start it.

Reply 17

Ronove

dans

I do not think that French is the easiest language to get to A level standard because most uni's that I have looked at require French to at least A level standard before you can start it.

That makes no sense whatsoever. However I would say that Spanish might be slightly easier than French at A level.

Reply 18

gaijin

dans

I do not think that French is the easiest language to get to A level standard because most uni's that I have looked at require French to at least A level standard before you can start it.

Its a de rigueur subject though. There is very little point offering ab initio courses for something that is taught from 12 years of age onwards in the national curriculum.